PRIVATE MEMBERS' TIME (Hansard, 21 November 1951)

§ The Minister of Health (Mr. Harry Crookshank)
I beg to move, That,—

(1) save as provided in paragraphs (2) and (5) of this Order, Government Business shall have precedence at every Sitting for the remainder of the Session;

(2) Public Bills, other than Government Bills, shall have precedence over Government Business on the following Fridays, namely 1st, 15th and 29th February, 14th and 28th March, 25th April, 9th and 23rd May, 27th June and 11th July;

(3) on and after Friday, 9th May, Public Bills other than Government Bills shall be arranged on the Order Paper in the following order:—Consideration of Lords Amendments. Third Readings, Considerations of Report not already entered upon, adjourned Proceedings on Consideration, Bills in progress in Committee, Bills appointed for Committee, and Second Readings;

(4) the ballot for unofficial Members' Bills shall he held on Thursday, 29th November, under arrangements to be made by Mr. Speaker, and the Bills shall be presented at the commencement of Public Business on Wednesday, 5th December;

(5) unofficial Members' Notices of Motions shall have precedence over Government Business on the following Fridays, namely, 8th and 22nd February, 7th and 21st March, 4th April, 2nd and 16th May, 20th June, 4th and 18th July; and no Notices of Motions shall he handed in for any of these Fridays in anticipation of the ballots under paragraph (6) of this Order;

(6) ballots for precedence of unofficial Members' Notices of Motion shall he held after Questions on the following Wednesdays, namely, 30th January, 6th and 20th February, 5th and 19th March, 23rd and 30th April, 28th May, 18th June and 2nd July; and

(7) nothing in this Order shall prevent unofficial Members giving Notices of Motions for leave to bring in Bills under Standing Order No. 12 (Motions for leave to bring in Bills and nomination of Select Committees at commencement of Public Business) or presenting Bills under Standing Order No. 35 (Presentation or introduction and first reading) after the presentation of unofficial Members' Bills referred to in paragraph (4) of this Order has taken place.
Last Thursday, the House will remember, I made a statement in which I explained the proposed arrangements for Private Members' time, and the right hon. Gentleman the Leader of the Opposition was good enough to express himself satisfied, so far as came within his province, with those arrangements. I said that it would be necessary to table a Motion. The Motion set out on the Order Paper, 399 and which I have moved, is the one to which I refer.
It is of some importance that it should be accepted without delay, if we are to be able to keep to the time-table and place in the Lobby a list on which hon. Members may sign their names in order to ballot for Bills next Tuesday and Wednesday, as a preliminary to the Ballot itself on Thursday.
I think the Motion is self-explanatory, but, if there are any questions which hon. Members wish to put to me, I will do my best to answer them. I hope the Motion will commend itself to the House.

§ Mr. Geoffrey de Freitas
As I understand under the terms of this Motion, if an hon. Member of the House is out of the country on Parliamentary business, say, in Australia or at Strasbourg next week, he can get another hon. Member to put down his name for the Ballot, but, if he is lucky in the Ballot, he has to be here in person on 5th December to present the Bill to the House.
I am not asking for any delay in this matter, but I would like to ask the right hon. Gentleman to consider amending the Motion to allow an hon. Member who is out of the country on Parliamentary business, if lucky in the Ballot, to present a Bill by proxy on 5th December.

§ Mr. Crookshank
This is quite a novel suggestion. Doing anything by proxy in this House would be a breach of our tradition, and I am not at all sure that the suggestion would be acceptable to hon. Members as a whole. Of course, if it is, and it is conveyed to me as such, I am in the hands of the House, because this is Private Members' time, but it would be necessary to put down a further Motion in that case.

§ Mr. de Freitas
The point I am making is that an hon. Member must, of course, not only be out of the country but out of the country on Parliamentary business, such as in Australia or as a member of an official delegation.

§ Mr. Crookshank
I quite recognise that, but an hon. Member might fall sick and not be able to come to the House, or he might have an accident. Once we start on the business of proxies, we are opening a very wide door.

§ Mr. Herbert Morrison
I only want to say that, as my right hon. Friend the Leader of the Opposition said, these proposals do follow, I think substantially, what was done last year, with a slight improvement or amendment—anyway, it probably is an improvement—and we think that, generally, they should be acceptable to the House.